HIST 221 Lecture Notes - Lecture 20: Second New Deal, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Underconsumption
19 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
End Poverty in California (EPIC)
Upton Sinclair's campaign for government of California
Public works, social welfare (distribution of money to poor
people), tax reform
○
I, Governor of California and How I Ended Poverty
People wanted to take the democratic party and wanted
to move it in a more socialist direction
§
○
Production for use plan
Factories
§
Farms
§
Movie studios
People should be able to use these facilities to do
whatever they wanted with like making movies
supporting the union or farming, etc.
□
§
○
Important influence on the New Deal
○
Becomes increasingly radicalized by the poverty he sees
around him
○
This campaign freaked out Franklin Roosevelt
Leftist activism worried people in the democratic party
who did not want to be taken over by socialists
§
Affected how FDR framed the New Deal going forward
§
○
-
Second New Deal (1935-38)
Coincides to when FDR starts campaigning for re-election
-
Aimed to street the New Deal into a more populist direction
Worries about radical politics
○
-
Turn to focus on under-consumption
Consumption had been the power of US economic growth, the
New Deal isn't giving people enough money to consume and
inject money back into the economy to get it where it was and
balance the economy
○
-
Sought to boost consumer power through: (a policy that was aimed
to redistribute wealth)
Support strong labour unions
○
Larger social welfare programs
○
Ambitious public work programs
○
-
Fiscal policy: viewed government borrowing as useful
Continued expansion of an already expanded government and
the amount of debt that the US economy is allowed to get
itself in
○
-
Social Security Act (1935)
Required states to make welfare funds available for:
Elderly poor
○
Unemployed
○
Unmarried mothers with children
○
The disabled
○
-
Federal pension program
Funded by employee and employer taxation
○
Seen as radical in the US during this time period
○
-
Created Ssec bureau
-
Excluded agricultural and domestic workers
Not entitled to social security benefits
○
These people are heavily raced and gendered
○
The benefits were not distributed in an equitable way
○
-
National Labour Relations Act/Wagner Act
Gives power to unions/unionisation in the US
-
Promised workers right to join unions
-
Required employers to recognize and bargain with unions
-
Outlawed blacklisting strike-breaking and discriminatory firings
-
NLRB(oard) had power to investigate and punish violators
-
Upswing of union membership during the 1930s
-
Result: dramatic increase in union membership
-
Fair labour standards act of 1938
National minimum wage
○
Prohibited oppressive child labour
○
-
New Democratic Coalition
FDR upped populist rhetoric end of first term
Stressed economic freedoms and the right of decent homes,
productive work, and protections against the vicissitudes of
life
○
Emphasis on collective good: only through the submerging of
individual desires into unselfish and practical cooperation can
civilization grow
○
Emphasis on people using the government to fight the tyranny
of economic royalists
○
-
1936 election: FDR huge victory
Received 98.5% of the votes during the election
○
-
FDR's coalition combined: Southern Protestants, northern Jews,
Catholics and Blacks from urban areas, labour union members, small
farmers in the middle west and plain states and liberals and radicals
-
Mexican ''Repatriation''
Estimated 1 million people of Mexican descent
-
Raids, scare tactics, deportation, repatriation and public pressure
-
60% of those leaving the US were citizens
-
Mexicans comprised nearly half of all those deported during the
decade, although they made up less than 1% of the country's
population
Important because South American labour was relied on
○
Wanted to remove them to give acts to Americans
○
-
Many of remaining not protected by Wagner act or helped by Social
Security
-
During the 1930s Mexican agricultural workers comprised a lot of
agricultural workers
-
Industrialists and their Allies
National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), 35,000
manufacturers
-
NAM president: public current misunderstanding of American
business and business leaders had resulted from American
industry's failure to tell its story
-
Created national industrial information committee to counter the
New Deal
Give narratives to counter the new deal and justify business
○
-
Extensive use of mass media: radio, motion pictures, film, ads,
billboards, school displays
-
Helped form oppositional coalition of big business, middle-class and
southern democrats, civil libertarians
-
Almost no textual reference to the phrase "The American Way"
-
So, what was the American Industry's "story"?
Industrialists were the true leaders of the nation. The public
interests including workers' were safe in their hands. False
leaders were attempting to usurp their rightful place.
○
-
Invention of term "free enterprise" which NAM framed as an
endangered civil liberty
-
Emphasis on attainability of American Dream and inclusiveness of
this dream
-
Framing of unionists as "outside radicals" corrupting American from
within
-
Criticism of FDR
Especially 1937 - Court Packing Fiasco
○
Picks new court members himself which makes him seem like
he was a dictator
○
-
Americanism was linked to capitalism and less regulation of big
businesses
-
Works Progress Administration (WPA)
Provided jobs to 30% of US unemployed, 8.5 million Americans
-
Huge public works
500,000 miles of roads
○
100,000 bridges
○
100,000 public buildings
○
600 airports
○
-
Huge public art programs
Federal project #1
○
Farms security administration
Painters
§
Theater (directors/actors to put on theater productions)
§
Intellectuals
§
Photographers
Creation of most iconic images of the great
depression which argue a different interpretation
of the American Way that businesses advertise
□
Celebration of multi race workforce □
§
○
-
The employment of artists during the New Deal helped many
unemployed artists and creators make a living. Bit it also sparked
many debated about whether the government should fund the arts
(or whether this constituted propaganda) and whether artists could
remain independent in their visions if they were working for the
government
-
New dealers, unionists and industrialists had competing narratives
of what constituted the American way
-
All claimed to represent the consensus or the average American or
the majority of Americans
-
All claimed that their version best ensured future material
prosperity and that their political and economic plans represented
the most expansive, democratic version of America
-
Economic downturn of 37-38 helped make 1938 elections more
conservative
-
Lecture 20 - Which American Way? Part II
Wednesday, February 21, 2018
9:31 AM
End Poverty in California (EPIC)
Upton Sinclair's campaign for government of California
Public works, social welfare (distribution of money to poor
people), tax reform
○
I, Governor of California and How I Ended Poverty
People wanted to take the democratic party and wanted
to move it in a more socialist direction
§
○
Production for use plan
Factories
§
Farms
§
Movie studios
People should be able to use these facilities to do
whatever they wanted with like making movies
supporting the union or farming, etc.
□
§
○
Important influence on the New Deal
○
Becomes increasingly radicalized by the poverty he sees
around him
○
This campaign freaked out Franklin Roosevelt
Leftist activism worried people in the democratic party
who did not want to be taken over by socialists
§
Affected how FDR framed the New Deal going forward
§
○
-
Second New Deal (1935-38)
Coincides to when FDR starts campaigning for re-election
-
Aimed to street the New Deal into a more populist direction
Worries about radical politics
○
-
Turn to focus on under-consumption
Consumption had been the power of US economic growth, the
New Deal isn't giving people enough money to consume and
inject money back into the economy to get it where it was and
balance the economy
○
-
Sought to boost consumer power through: (a policy that was aimed
to redistribute wealth)
Support strong labour unions
○
Larger social welfare programs
○
Ambitious public work programs
○
-
Fiscal policy: viewed government borrowing as useful
Continued expansion of an already expanded government and
the amount of debt that the US economy is allowed to get
itself in
○
-
Social Security Act (1935)
Required states to make welfare funds available for:
Elderly poor
○
Unemployed
○
Unmarried mothers with children
○
The disabled
○
-
Federal pension program
Funded by employee and employer taxation
○
Seen as radical in the US during this time period
○
-
Created Ssec bureau
-
Excluded agricultural and domestic workers
Not entitled to social security benefits
○
These people are heavily raced and gendered
○
The benefits were not distributed in an equitable way
○
-
National Labour Relations Act/Wagner Act
Gives power to unions/unionisation in the US
-
Promised workers right to join unions
-
Required employers to recognize and bargain with unions
-
Outlawed blacklisting strike-breaking and discriminatory firings
-
NLRB(oard) had power to investigate and punish violators
-
Upswing of union membership during the 1930s
-
Result: dramatic increase in union membership
-
Fair labour standards act of 1938
National minimum wage
○
Prohibited oppressive child labour
○
-
New Democratic Coalition
FDR upped populist rhetoric end of first term
Stressed economic freedoms and the right of decent homes,
productive work, and protections against the vicissitudes of
life
○
Emphasis on collective good: only through the submerging of
individual desires into unselfish and practical cooperation can
civilization grow
○
Emphasis on people using the government to fight the tyranny
of economic royalists
○
-
1936 election: FDR huge victory
Received 98.5% of the votes during the election
○
-
FDR's coalition combined: Southern Protestants, northern Jews,
Catholics and Blacks from urban areas, labour union members, small
farmers in the middle west and plain states and liberals and radicals
-
Mexican ''Repatriation''
Estimated 1 million people of Mexican descent
-
Raids, scare tactics, deportation, repatriation and public pressure
-
60% of those leaving the US were citizens
-
Mexicans comprised nearly half of all those deported during the
decade, although they made up less than 1% of the country's
population
Important because South American labour was relied on
○
Wanted to remove them to give acts to Americans
○
-
Many of remaining not protected by Wagner act or helped by Social
Security
-
During the 1930s Mexican agricultural workers comprised a lot of
agricultural workers
-
Industrialists and their Allies
National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), 35,000
manufacturers
-
NAM president: public current misunderstanding of American
business and business leaders had resulted from American
industry's failure to tell its story
-
Created national industrial information committee to counter the
New Deal
Give narratives to counter the new deal and justify business
○
-
Extensive use of mass media: radio, motion pictures, film, ads,
billboards, school displays
-
Helped form oppositional coalition of big business, middle-class and
southern democrats, civil libertarians
-
Almost no textual reference to the phrase "The American Way"
-
So, what was the American Industry's "story"?
Industrialists were the true leaders of the nation. The public
interests including workers' were safe in their hands. False
leaders were attempting to usurp their rightful place.
○
-
Invention of term "free enterprise" which NAM framed as an
endangered civil liberty
-
Emphasis on attainability of American Dream and inclusiveness of
this dream
-
Framing of unionists as "outside radicals" corrupting American from
within
-
Criticism of FDR
Especially 1937 - Court Packing Fiasco
○
Picks new court members himself which makes him seem like
he was a dictator
○
-
Americanism was linked to capitalism and less regulation of big
businesses
-
Works Progress Administration (WPA)
Provided jobs to 30% of US unemployed, 8.5 million Americans
-
Huge public works
500,000 miles of roads
○
100,000 bridges
○
100,000 public buildings
○
600 airports
○
-
Huge public art programs
Federal project #1
○
Farms security administration
Painters
§
Theater (directors/actors to put on theater productions)
§
Intellectuals
§
Photographers
Creation of most iconic images of the great
depression which argue a different interpretation
of the American Way that businesses advertise
□
Celebration of multi race workforce □
§
○
-
The employment of artists during the New Deal helped many
unemployed artists and creators make a living. Bit it also sparked
many debated about whether the government should fund the arts
(or whether this constituted propaganda) and whether artists could
remain independent in their visions if they were working for the
government
-
New dealers, unionists and industrialists had competing narratives
of what constituted the American way
-
All claimed to represent the consensus or the average American or
the majority of Americans
-
All claimed that their version best ensured future material
prosperity and that their political and economic plans represented
the most expansive, democratic version of America
-
Economic downturn of 37-38 helped make 1938 elections more
conservative
-
Lecture 20 - Which American Way? Part II
Wednesday, February 21, 2018 9:31 AM
Document Summary
Public works, social welfare (distribution of money to poor people), tax reform. I, governor of california and how i ended poverty. People wanted to take the democratic party and wanted to move it in a more socialist direction. People should be able to use these facilities to do whatever they wanted with like making movies supporting the union or farming, etc. Becomes increasingly radicalized by the poverty he sees around him. Leftist activism worried people in the democratic party who did not want to be taken over by socialists. Affected how fdr framed the new deal going forward. Coincides to when fdr starts campaigning for re-election. Aimed to street the new deal into a more populist direction. Consumption had been the power of us economic growth, the. New deal isn"t giving people enough money to consume and inject money back into the economy to get it where it was and balance the economy.
